Barcelona Keeper To Have Man City Medical But Joe Hart May Not Be Leaving After All

Barcelona goalkeeper Claudio Bravo has moved one step closer to joining Pep Guardiola at Manchester City, and is on his way to England to complete the move.

Barcelona confirmed at the weekend, following Bravo’s involvement in his side’s 6-2 win against Real Betis, that an agreement had been reached with Man City to take the 33-year-old to the Premier League.

FC Barcelona technical secretary Robert Fernández: “We have the beginning of an agreement with Manchester City for Claudio Bravo” #FCBlive

Barca had been stalling in recent days as they didn’t want to be left without a first-choice keeper for the beginning of their La Liga defence – injury to Marc-André ter Stegen would have meant that third-choice Jordi Masip would have had to start.

A deal is in place to sign Dutch international Jasper Cillessen from Ajax, but that transfer also remains incomplete for the time being.

As soon as that deal is over the line, Barcelona will give the green light for Bravo to become a Manchester City player. As it stands currently, that is expected to happen on Thursday after Ajax’s Champions League playoff second leg against PAOK.

With Bravo coming in, current Man City second-choice Joe Hart had been expected to leave the club in order to ave his England career. However, the Guardian are this morning reporting that this may now not be the case.

Despite reported interest from the likes of Everton and Sevilla, Hart is yet to receive a suitable offer, and with just eight days of the transfer window remaining, he could be set to stay at the Etihad as third choice behind Bravo and Willy Caballero.

This will seriously affect his chances of playing for England – new manager Sam Allardyce has already suggested that Hart needs to be playing regularly to remain as his number one – so to be at a club where he is not even on the bench most weeks could well kill off his international career.

That could change in the next few days, but the report states that Hart has accepted that he might not be going anywhere until January at the earliest.